by Dara Horn
The cab that finally stopped for him was an open-air type, with nothing dividing the driver from the passengers. The driver was older than Jacob’s father, a wiry man with a sagging belly and thinning blond hair like his father’s combed across his narrow head. Jacob had hoped to find a carriage with a younger driver, someone who would have less trouble helping him up to the running board and into his seat. But when the driver stopped the carriage and saw Jacob with his patch and cane, he immediately came down to assist him. Jacob tried to wave him away, but he was surprised by how strong the older man was. Without a word, and with utter dignity, he lifted Jacob’s body up into the cab. As he returned to his perch, he smiled at Jacob, asked him where he was going, and told him the fare. Jacob settled back in his seat and was enjoying the ride on that bright afternoon, relieved and thrilled to have been treated as though he were merely another human being, when the driver turned to him and asked, apropos of nothing, “Where were you wounded?”
It occurred to Jacob that, for a driver picking him up at a hotel, the more normal question might have been “Where are you from?” But normalcy no longer applied to him; he had become a walking symbol of defeat. He grimaced, and answered.
“Mississippi,” he said.
“Vicksburg?” the driver asked.
People always asked that, Jacob had noticed, if they ventured to ask at all. At least his disfigurement ought to have contributed to a battle the Union had won, they seemed to demand, so that they could count Jacob’s missing eye and hobbled legs to be the worthy price of victory, and look at him without guilt. “No, I never made it that far,” Jacob said, and reddened with shame.
The driver sighed, and in his sigh Jacob was alarmed to hear less pity than disgust. “Revolting, isn’t it,” the driver said.
“Pardon?” he asked. The few people who dared to speak to him since his injury had invariably congratulated him, praising his “service,” his “valor,” his “sacrifice.” They used words like “heroic” and “courageous.” Of course, “revolting” was what they were all actually thinking, he knew. But never before had he heard it said aloud. Perhaps he had imagined it.
“It’s absolutely revolting,” the driver repeated. “All you boys dead or mangled, and for what?”
It was the question that the entire country was afraid to ask. Jacob’s remaining eye opened wide.
“I’ll tell you for what,” the driver said. His voice wasn’t angry, or even harsh. To Jacob it sounded radiant, the outer edge of prophecy.
“I’m listening,” Jacob said. He looked at the woolen scarf wound around the driver’s narrow neck, and at last succeeded in ignoring the pain in his legs as the carriage bumped over loose cobblestones. It was exhilarating just to be sitting alone with this driver in this cab, far away from his parents and New York, independent again, and at last close to the truth. No one had ever even tried to answer that question for him before, and it was the only question he needed answered. “Tell me,” he said.
“For niggers, abolitionists, Republicans, and Jews, that’s for what,” the driver announced. “Blame the Rebels all you want, but that’s who did that to you, my friend. They’re the only ones with something to gain. The niggers and the abolitionists got what they wanted, and now it’s the Republicans and the Jews running the show. It always was, behind it all. The Seligmans are the ones making the uniforms. The more boys like you who are killed or mangled, the richer they get. Your blood is their gold.”
Jacob thought of Rebecca Seligman—the daughter of the founder of the Seligman dry-goods empire, who was a client of his father’s in New York. Once, at a luncheon at another family’s house when he was six years old, Jacob had gone to the cloakroom to fetch an extra handkerchief and had come across seventeen-year-old Rebecca Seligman with her bodice and corset opened, panting in the arms of the son of one of her father’s rivals. It was Jacob’s first glimpse of breathing beauty. In the back of the hansom, he briefly engaged in a small mental fantasy in which he spat in the driver’s face and jumped down to the street without paying the fare. But his crippling had consequences, and he was the driver’s prisoner. He shifted his lame legs, and thought of another way to escape.
“Sir, you are absolutely right,” he replied. “And I am so relieved to finally meet someone who isn’t afraid to say it.”
The carriage just in front of theirs had stopped, and now the driver turned to look at Jacob. He grinned, thrilled.
“Thank you!” he cried. “And what a relief for me, to finally meet someone who isn’t afraid to look for a little dignity for himself.” He offered Jacob his hand. “My name is Donaldson—Charles Hunt Donaldson. What is your name, young man?”
Jacob paused for an instant, and then smiled. “Edwin McAllister,” he said.
The driver took his hand and squinted at him, examining his face. For an instant Jacob wondered if the man had somehow recognized him, if he knew who he really was. But then the driver spoke. “The McAllisters from Bucks County? You wouldn’t be Chester McAllister’s brother, would you?”
Jacob hesitated, before deciding he had nothing to lose. “I am,” he said.
The driver’s face turned grave. Adopting the liar’s habit, Jacob adjusted his own face accordingly, glancing back down at his knees. “My profound condolences,” the driver said, and clasped Jacob’s hand in both of his. “I used to work up near Bucks, and I heard about it from one of my passengers last year. What happened to your brother was a crime, son. Executed for trying to desert! Absolutely obscene. It was murder, that’s what it was.”
Jacob looked up again, trying his best to keep his face severe, grateful for his scars and his eye patch. “I can’t say I disagree,” he said.
“My most profound condolences. May the Lord compensate him in heaven, and may his soul be avenged on earth,” the driver said. He pumped Jacob’s hand. “It is truly an honor to meet you, Mr. McAllister,” he said. “I can’t tell you what a pleasure it is to meet someone with some sense still left in his skull, in a country full of fools.”
The carriage in front of them had moved, and now the driver whipped the horse into a brisk trot, leading them around a corner. On the right Jacob saw the tall white columns of the Board of Brokers rising above the street, recognizing it from his last visit, four years earlier. Tight knots of men in top hats gathered on the marble steps, just as they had four years before, as though this place were a tiny coin that had fallen through a hole in time’s pocket. He scanned the crowd for Philip, but didn’t see him. Then he slipped his watch out of his vest and saw that it was a quarter of an hour too soon.
“Of course, maybe this whole war is simply divine punishment for the fools, for being duped into electing a nigger president,” the driver called to him over his shoulder. “Heaven help us all if he is elected again. Perhaps we will be blessed to see Providence make an end to him.” The carriage slowed, and the driver pulled the horse to a stop. He turned his head toward Jacob. “Of course, Providence might well benefit from the assistance of mortals,” he added.
The driver looked at Jacob with a strange elation in his features, his reddened face pinched with glee. He was a man who rejoiced in being infuriated, Jacob saw—drinking up rage like liquor, reveling in it, dependent on it, always eager for more. He had what Harry Hyams, for all his throttled fury, had lacked: the delight in anger that makes real evil possible, that makes destruction fun.
“I could think of no more worthy task than to serve Providence in that respect,” Jacob said.
The driver paused, watching Jacob, judging. His smile vanished. Then he turned around completely in his seat, bending down until his face was nearly level with Jacob’s. “I would like to know whether you really mean that,” he said.
At that moment, anything was possible. For an instant Jacob felt his heart lurch toward fear and failure, felt himself about to laugh the whole thing off as an exaggerated joke. But in the last remaining second, he rallied, and looked the driver in the eyes.
“Yes
,” he said. He shifted his cane across his lap, pressing his fingers against his knees, trying not to wince. “And I’m not afraid to say it.”
The driver glanced at the street. There were three cabs in the line ahead of theirs; no one was standing nearby. He leaned toward Jacob, and lowered his voice. “There are some men you might like to meet,” he said. “Men who feel the way you do.”
Jacob braced his cane against his legs. “Really,” he replied. “Who?”
The driver glanced again at the street. This time a man was approaching the side of the carriage, starting to climb up onto the platform, waiting to board. The driver waved at him. “Sorry, sir,” he called. “No more rides now. Horse’s shoe is a bit loose. I’ve got to get him back to the stable.” The man paused, and glanced at Jacob before quickly looking away, as nearly everyone who looked at Jacob did. Jacob watched as the man climbed down and waved away the few other men in top hats who had gathered beside the platform. Then the driver reached under his perch for a wooden sign, painted with the words OFF DUTY—WILL SOON RETURN. He hung it on the side of the carriage, and turned back to Jacob. He reached into his pocket and withdrew his hand, his fingers balled into a tight fist. Then he grasped Jacob’s hand, and Jacob felt something small and metallic pressed into his palm. When the driver took his hand away, Jacob opened his fingers and was surprised to see a small gold-colored ring.
He held it between his thumb and index finger, examining it. He thought of how he had held Jeannie’s mother’s ring in the air at their wedding, and tried not to notice how his blood was draining down into his damaged legs. The world circled around him, fierce and dizzying. He clutched his cane, holding still.
“We are the Order of the Sons of Liberty, formerly the Knights of the Golden Circle,” the driver said. Now his face was inches from Jacob’s. Avoiding the driver’s eyes, Jacob looked down again at the ring, weighing it in his palm. It clearly wasn’t made of gold; brass perhaps. This time he noticed the engraved words circling the ring’s inner surface: COME RETRIBUTION. “Our responsibility is to protect American liberty when no one else will,” the driver continued. “We have been attempting to recruit more men like you, men who know the Federal army well. You yourself can avenge your brother’s death.”
Jacob looked up at the driver, pressing his lips together. Without a word, he nodded.
“You have business to take care of this afternoon?” the driver asked, waving a hand at the columns on the right.
“Yes,” Jacob said.
“The head of our Philadelphia group has a seat on the exchange. His name is John Clarke. You can introduce yourself to him with this ring. How long will you be here in town?”
“Not long,” Jacob said. “I—I have a business obligation in New York.”
“The Order exists in New York too. I’m not certain who the leaders are there, but you might contact Clarke’s brother-in-law. Look for a man named Edwin Booth. He’s a partner in Clarke’s firm. Wherever you go, show them the ring. Tell them what happened to your brother. You have nothing to be ashamed of. Retribution shall be yours.”
“Thank you,” Jacob said. He reached into his pocket and pulled out his change purse. But when he presented the driver with the fare, the driver pushed back his hand.
“Please, you owe me nothing,” the driver said. He came down from his perch and lifted Jacob bodily out of his seat, transporting him from the carriage to the platform to the sidewalk. As the driver carried him, Jacob closed his good eye, almost enjoying it. When he was standing upright again, the driver once more shook his hand, and then climbed back up to his perch. “Long live liberty!” he called, and flicked his whip against the horse’s back.
Jacob watched as the carriage with its sign moved from the curb and drove away. Then he walked toward the exchange, and began waiting for Philip Mordecai Levy. It was a bright autumn afternoon, and for the first time in years, for reasons he did not quite understand, he felt a lightness and liberation that almost resembled happiness. He had been off duty, but he would soon return.
4.
ONE CAN ALWAYS TELL THE STATE OF A NATION BY STANDING alongside the doors of a big city exchange and watching the faces of the men walking in and out. Jacob noticed this the very first time he ever went to the stock exchange in New York, when he was fourteen years old. His father had sent him there to bring someone a message, and he had waited just outside the doors on a hot, late summer afternoon. The ’57 panic had begun, and as he watched the men coming through those doors, rivulets of sweat dripping down their cheeks and necks as they emerged into the heavy humid air, he saw how none of them looked at anyone else, even if they were involved in conversation with the men beside them. Each man’s eyes were focused on the narrow strip of bare ground just in front of his own feet, and each man’s brows were drawn together, a tight knot of worry lodged at the base of each man’s forehead. Even at fourteen, Jacob had sensed the queasy dread of every man there, the seasick feeling of a ship’s deck falling away beneath one’s feet. Now Jacob saw the faces of the men outside the Philadelphia Board of Brokers and recognized once more that seasick fear. For a few moments he stood by the towering Greek columns and watched harried, worried bodies shuffling in and out, their eyes fixed on the ground, and he searched for Philip among them. But he couldn’t stand up for long without pain, and he didn’t want Philip to see him suffering. At last a group of men vacated a bench alongside the steps leading to the entrance. Jacob sank down onto it, overwhelmed with relief. And then he saw Philip coming down the stairs.
At first Jacob didn’t recognize him. His hair was completely gray, and even with his overcoat Jacob could see that he had become rail-thin. His unbuttoned coat and dark suit hung on his gaunt frame like clothes on a scarecrow, and he held a battered top hat in his hands. His pince-nez looked new, smaller, and he squinted through the lenses in the bright sunlight. Jacob watched as he descended the marble stairs. His shoulders were hunched, as though the sky were pressing down on him, forcing him to bear its weight. The first time Jacob tried to call to him, his voice stuck in his throat. It was only after several tries that he finally managed to shout his name.
“Mr. Levy!”
Philip stopped and looked around. Despite his stoop, he seemed quite alert, almost anxious. But when he turned in Jacob’s direction, he looked through him, his eyes passing right over the eye-patched cripple on the bench. “Mr. Levy!” Jacob called again.
Philip turned toward Jacob, and flinched. But Jacob had become accustomed to that. He stood, an effort that required all the time it took Philip to cover the distance between them. Then they were standing face to face.
For a moment they looked at each other in silence. Jacob had imagined, on the long anxious train ride that morning, that Philip would look at him with that same expression of contempt that Abigail’s brother had given him in Holly Springs, or even that Philip would draw out a revolver and point it at his chest. Instead, Philip looked at him for a long time, taking in his eye patch, his scars, his cane, his hobbled legs. Then, very slowly, he extended his hand to Jacob.
Jacob raised his right hand to take Philip’s, balancing himself with his left hand on his cane. It was a gesture that he had long perfected, but now he stumbled, and fell against Philip’s chest. Locked in a grotesque parody of an embrace, Jacob felt Philip’s damp cheek on his neck.
They sat down on the bench, side by side. Philip’s eyes were sunken into his skull. He had become an old man. When he finally spoke, his voice was cold.
“My regards to your father,” he said. “Please thank him for me, for sending you.”
The words turned Jacob back into a child, one whose behavior the adults will no longer tolerate. He bit his lip, feeling himself sinking into the ground. He had never seen Philip’s letter to his father—what had Philip written? His heart fluttered like a child’s, afraid that his father knew what he had done.
“Did you tell him—” Jacob started to say.
“No,” Philip said. Jac
ob breathed with relief. “I didn’t want to endanger you,” Philip added, “in case you were still working—well, in the field.” In all the time Jacob knew him, he had never heard Philip use the word “spy.” Philip coughed, and continued. “I merely inquired after your family. I wrote that I remembered you in passing, and asked if you had enlisted. He told me you were wounded and had come home. I hoped we might see each other.”
Jacob wanted to ask him, then, why he didn’t seem to despise him. But he couldn’t bring himself to ask; perhaps Philip did. Instead he asked, “How did you come here?”
Philip looked down at his knees, avoiding Jacob’s good eye. “I was exchanged for my daughter,” he said. For an instant Jacob’s soul ignited, flaring with hope. Philip added, “For Charlotte.”
Jacob trembled, a reflex that lingered after two full years. “For Lottie?”
“It only happened three months ago,” Philip said, his voice low. “No one explained it to me at the time. A military escort took me out of prison and brought me to the lines. Federal troops were waiting for me there. Later I was informed that it had been your idea.”
Since his injury, Jacob was prone to headaches, a hard dull burn inside his skull behind where his right eye used to be. Now he felt the pain seeping in, deep within his head. He pressed the heel of his hand against his temple and tried to think. It was his idea? But his idea had been to exchange Philip for Jeannie, two years ago, when she was still alive!
